Joe Thomas says Browns’ wide zone blocking scheme is easier for a rookie tackle to learn

Editor's note: Tony Grossi is a Cleveland Browns analyst for TheLandOnDemand.com and 850 ESPN Cleveland.

INDIANAPOLIS

There is little mystery to the marching orders for GM Andrew Berry and coach Kevin Stefanski with the first draft choice of their partnership.

The Browns have to come away with the best offensive tackle with their first draft pick, No. 10 overall. Check that. The best offensive tackle to fit their system.

That may not necessarily be the top-rated offensive tackle of this draft.

The Browns are going back to the wide zone blocking scheme. Athletic, nimble linemen are in. Road-grading behemoths are out.

Think back to 2014 with Kyle Shanahan as Browns offensive coordinator.

Lateral movement by the offensive line – notably Joe Thomas and Alex Mack and Mitchell Schwartz. Five 300-pounders in all, moving in precise tandem like a picket fence with 10 legs. Then an abrupt turn upfield as the running back cuts to the inside or outside.

“Everybody’s footwork has to be in unison,” said Thomas, the future Browns Hall of Famer. “When you watch a nice outside zone scheme, you’re seeing everybody’s foot hitting the ground at the same time with the same angle, and their pads and helmets are in the same perspective and position on their defender … their hands, their pad level. It just looks like five mirror images of each other.”

To connoisseurs of offensive line, it’s a beautiful thing. To defenders, it’s maddening.

The movement of the offensive line screams run. Then the quarterback fakes a handoff, and the defense is in an “Oh, shucks” situation. How do you think Brian Hoyer had receivers so wide open in that 2014 season?

“The wide zone is the best at matching with play-action,” Thomas said. “From a defense’s perspective, when you have a run that’s coming at you that’s a wide zone, it looks just like the play-action. Whereas, inside zone and gap schemes, those type of play actions just don’t have the same sell because they just can’t look the same.”

The scheme goes back to former Denver coach Mike Shanahan, Kyle’s father, who taught it to Gary Kubiak, who won a Super Bowl with the Broncos and then came out of semi-retirement to teach it to Stefanski in Minnesota last year.

“That is the starting point [of the Browns’ new offense],” said offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt last week. “It will start with the wide zone and the play-action pass … it will be a big part of what we do.”

Special skill set

So when the Browns scout linemen, they’re not necessarily looking for the strongest or the biggest. They’re looking for linemen who can move laterally.

There could be six offensive tackles taken in the first round of the 2020 draft. Tristan Wirfs of Iowa, Josh Jones of Houston and Austin Jackson of USC approach the Combine as the likeliest to prove their nimbleness in the athletic tests.

“I would say your first 10 yards sprint in the 40 is probably an important test they’ll look at [at the Combine],” said Thomas, “They’ll probably look at how you move in the three-cone [drill], how you move in the short shuttle. If I saw only one test, I’d look at the first 10 yards of the 40. That’s the most important thing running in the wide zone. How fast can I go from the line of scrimmage when the ball is snapped and get five yards down the field?”

Now, this may not disqualify a 370-behemoth like Mekhi Becton of Louisville, who may be the rare physical freak to possess the mobility at that weight to fit the wide zone scheme.

“Kyle always said there was a misconception that when Mike and Kyle and Kubiak ran their scheme, that they liked smaller linemen,” Thomas said. “But the reason they usually had smaller guys was they were athletic and could stay healthy. Bigger guys have more wear and tear on their bodies and have more trouble staying healthy. But if you can find a big guy that can move and stay healthy, that’s like the mecca.

“Because one of the keys to the wide zone is your first three steps, getting your helmet in the right placement on the defensive lineman. But then you need to work up the field. You can’t just run sideways. When you’re big and you have momentum and inertia and mass, and you make contact with somebody, now you’re blowing them off the line of scrimmage and now what the running back can do is get on his track. Once he takes his first couple steps, where his shoulders are aiming, if he’s able to run on that line, the longer the better. Because that enables him to make his cut later, which makes more holes in the defense.

“What the defense wants to do is force that cut as soon as possible. When that running back’s able to run a long time without cutting back, it just opens up holes. Every step he makes, there’s more angles and holes he’s able to get into.”

Rookie friendly

Thomas has been outspoken in saying he favors building an offensive line through free agency because college linemen play such a vastly different game and need years to develop the sophistication of NFL blocking.

But guess what? Thomas believes the wide zone scheme is easier for college linemen to learn.

“The good is that when you’re a wide zone team, that’s mostly what you do and the techniques carry over from play to play and from runs to play actions,” he said. “Once you learn it, you have kind of mastered everything. Whereas a conventional running scheme, there’s a bunch of different techniques that are a little bit easier to learn but there’s a lot of them, so it’s harder to master.

“It’s much easier to take a college player and teach him the wide zone when he’s a rookie than it is to teach him a different running concept. So you’ll be able to get a rookie up to speed much sooner than you would be able to take a rookie and put him in another running scheme.”

Since Thomas retired after the 2017 season, the Browns have auditioned Shon Coleman, Joel Bitonio, Desmond Harrison and Greg Robinson at left tackle.

On Friday, Thomas will serve as an analyst on NFL Network’s coverage of the offensive tackle workouts. One of them should be the Browns’ first pick in the draft in April. Thomas probably will know which one fits best.